The effects of radiofrequency exposure on cognition: A systematic review and meta-analysis of human observational studies.

Background: We aimed to assess evidence of long-term effects of exposure to radiofrequency (RF) electromagnetic fields (EMF) on indicators of cognition, including domains of learning and memory, executive function, complex attention, language, perceptual motor ability and social cognition, and of an exposure-response relationship between RF-EMF and cognition.

Methods: We searched PubMed, Embase, PsycInfo and the EMF-Portal on September 30, 2022 without limiting by date or language of publication. We included cohort or case-control studies that evaluated the effects of RF exposure on cognitive function in one or more of the cognitive domains.

Development of a search filter to retrieve reports of interrupted time series studies from MEDLINE and PubMed.

Background: Interrupted time series (ITS) studies contribute importantly to systematic reviews of population-level interventions. We aimed to develop and validate search filters to retrieve ITS studies in MEDLINE and PubMed.

Methods: A total of 1017 known ITS studies (published 2013-2017) were analysed using text mining to generate candidate terms.

Effectiveness of care bundles for prevention and treatment of postpartum hemorrhage: a systematic review.

Objective: Care bundles are a promising approach to reducing postpartum hemorrhage-related morbidity and mortality. We assessed the effectiveness and safety of care bundles for postpartum hemorrhage prevention and/or treatment.

Data Sources: We searched MEDLINE, Embase, Cochrane CENTRAL, Maternity and Infant Care Database, and Global Index Medicus (inception to June 9, 2023) and ClinicalTrials.

Evidence surveillance for a living clinical guideline: Case study of the Australian stroke guidelines.

Background: Continual evidence surveillance is an integral feature of living guidelines. The Australian Stroke Guidelines include recommendations on 100 clinical topics and have been 'living' since 2018.

Objectives: To describe the approach for establishing and evaluating an evidence surveillance system for the living Australian Stroke Guidelines.

Are COVID-19 systematic reviews up to date and can we tell? A cross-sectional study.

Background: COVID-19 led to a rapid acceleration in the number of systematic reviews. Readers need to know how up to date evidence is when selecting reviews to inform decisions. This cross-sectional study aimed to evaluate how easily the currency of COVID-19 systematic reviews published early in the pandemic could be determined and how up to date these reviews were at the time of publication.

Economic evaluations of maternal health interventions: a scoping review.

  Evidence on the affordability and cost-effectiveness of interventions is critical to decision-making for clinical practice guidelines and development of national health policies. This study aimed to develop a repository of primary economic evaluations to support global maternal health guideline development and provide insights into the body of research conducted in this field.   A scoping review was conducted to identify and map available economic evaluations of maternal health interventions.

Weekly updating of guideline recommendations was feasible: the Australian National COVID-19 clinical evidence Taskforce.

Objectives: To investigate how quickly evidence was incorporated into the Australian living guidelines for COVID-19 during the first 12 months of the pandemic.

Study Design And Setting: For each study concerning drug therapies included in the guideline from April 3, 2020 to April 1, 2021, we extracted the publication date of the study, and the guideline version the study was included in. We analyzed two subgroups of studies as follows: those published in high impact factor journals and those with 100 or more participants.

Methods for living guidelines: early guidance based on practical experience. Paper 4: search methods and approaches for living guidelines.

Objectives: To describe the key features of a continual evidence surveillance process that can be implemented for living guidelines and to outline the considerations and trade-offs in adopting different approaches.

Study Design And Setting: Members of the Australian Living Evidence Consortium (ALEC), National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE), and the US GRADE Network (USGN) shared their practical experiences of and approaches to establishing surveillance systems for living guidelines. We identified several common components of evidence surveillance and listed the key features and considerations for each component drawn from case studies, highlighting differences with standard guidelines.

Methods for living guidelines: early guidance based on practical experience. Paper 1: Introduction.

Objectives: To introduce methods for living guidelines based on practical experiences by the Australian Living Evidence Consortium (ALEC), the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE), and the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA), with methodological support from the US Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluations (GRADE) Network.

Study Design And Setting: Members of ALEC, NICE, and the US GRADE Network, convened a working group to share experiences of the methods used to develop living guidelines and outline the key differences between traditional and living guidelines methods.

Results: The guidance includes the following steps: 1) deciding if the guideline is a priority for a living approach, 2) preparing for living guideline development, 3) literature surveillance and frequency of searching, 4) assessment and synthesis of the evidence, 5) publication and dissemination, and 6) transitioning recommendations out of living mode.

[The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviewsDeclaración PRISMA 2020: una guía actualizada para la publicación de revisiones sistemáticas].

The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement, published in 2009, was designed to help systematic reviewers transparently report why the review was done, what the authors did, and what they found. Over the past decade, advances in systematic review methodology and terminology have necessitated an update to the guideline. The PRISMA 2020 statement replaces the 2009 statement and includes new reporting guidance that reflects advances in methods to identify, select, appraise, and synthesise studies.

Portable ultrasound technologies for estimating gestational age in pregnant women: a scoping review and analysis of commercially available models.

Objectives: To identify all available studies assessing the use of portable ultrasound devices for pregnant women, with the specific aim of finding evidence for devices used to determine gestational age and their validity when compared with conventional ultrasound machines. We also wanted to determine what portable ultrasound models are commercially available for obstetric use.

Design: Systematic scoping review.

Changing patterns in reporting and sharing of review data in systematic reviews with meta-analysis of the effects of interventions: cross sectional meta-research study.

Objectives: To examine changes in completeness of reporting and frequency of sharing data, analytical code, and other review materials in systematic reviews over time; and factors associated with these changes.

Design: Cross sectional meta-research study.

Population: Random sample of 300 systematic reviews with meta-analysis of aggregate data on the effects of a health, social, behavioural, or educational intervention.

Pragmatic and open science-based solution to a current problem in the reporting of living systematic reviews.

Living systematic reviews (LSRs) are an increasingly common approach to keeping reviews up to date, in which new relevant studies are incorporated as they become available, so as to inform healthcare policy and practice in a timely manner. While journal publishers have been exploring the publication of LSRs using different updating and publishing approaches, readers cannot currently assess if the evidence underpinning a published LSR is up to date, as neither the search details, the selection process, nor the list of identified studies is made available between the publication of updates. We describe a new method to transparently report the living evidence surveillance process that occurs between published LSR versions.

The National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce: pregnancy and perinatal guidelines.

Introduction: Pregnant women are at higher risk of severe illness from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) than non-pregnant women of a similar age. Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, it was clear that evidenced-based guidance was needed, and that it would need to be updated rapidly. The National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce provided a resource to guide care for people with COVID-19, including during pregnancy.

Care for adults with COVID-19: living guidelines from the National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce.

Introduction: The Australian National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce was established in March 2020 to maintain up-to-date recommendations for the treatment of people with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The original guideline (April 2020) has been continuously updated and expanded from nine to 176 recommendations, facilitated by the rapid identification, appraisal, and analysis of clinical trial findings and subsequent review by expert panels.

Main Recommendations: In this article, we describe the recommendations for treating non-pregnant adults with COVID-19, as current on 1 August 2022 (version 61.

Prevention and control of non-communicable diseases in antenatal, intrapartum, and postnatal care: a systematic scoping review of clinical practice guidelines since 2011.

Background: Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are a leading cause of maternal mortality and morbidity worldwide. The World Health Organization is developing new recommendations focusing on the management of NCDs for pregnant, intrapartum, and postnatal women. Thus, to support the development of new guidelines and recommendations, we aimed to determine the availability, focus, and scope of recommendations of current guidelines for the management of NCDs during pregnancy, intrapartum, and postnatal period.

Effectiveness of aromatherapy for prevention or treatment of disease, medical or preclinical conditions, and injury: protocol for a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Background: Aromatherapy - the therapeutic use of essential oils from plants (flowers, herbs or trees) to treat ill health and promote physical, emotional and spiritual well-being - is one of the most widely used natural therapies reported by consumers in Western countries. The Australian Government Department of Health (via the National Health and Medical Research Council) has commissioned a suite of independent evidence evaluations to inform the 2019-20 Review of the Australian Government Rebate on Private Health Insurance for Natural Therapies. This protocol is for one of the evaluations: a systematic review that aims to examine the effectiveness of aromatherapy in preventing and/or treating injury, disease, medical conditions or preclinical conditions.

Randomised trials in maternal and perinatal health in low and middle-income countries from 2010 to 2019: a systematic scoping review.

Objectives: To identify and map all trials in maternal health conducted in low and middle-income countries (LMIC) over the 10-year period from 2010 to 2019, to identify geographical and thematic trends, as well as comparing to global causes of maternal death and preidentified priority areas.

Design: Systematic scoping review.

Primary And Secondary Outcome Measures: Extracted data included location, study characteristics and whether trials corresponded to causes of mortality and identified research priority topics.

How frequently should "living" guidelines be updated? Insights from the Australian Living Stroke Guidelines.

Background: "Living guidelines" are guidelines which are continually kept up to date as new evidence emerges. Living guideline methods are evolving. The aim of this study was to determine how frequently searches for new evidence should be undertaken for the Australian Living Stroke Guidelines.

Most published systematic reviews of remdesivir for COVID-19 were redundant and lacked currency.

Objective: To investigate the completeness and currency of published systematic reviews of remdesivir for COVID-19 and to compare this with a living guidelines approach.

Study Design And Setting: In this cross-sectional study, we searched Europe PMC on May 20, 2021 for systematic reviews of remdesivir (including preprints, living review updates). Completeness and currency were based on the inclusion of four major randomized trials of remdesivir available at the time of publication of the review (including as preliminary results and preprints).

P2/N95 respirators & surgical masks to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infection: Effectiveness & adverse effects.

Background: Millions of people have acquired and died from SARS-CoV-2 infection during the COVID-19 pandemic. Healthcare workers (HCWs) are required to wear personal protective equipment (PPE), including surgical masks and P2/N95 respirators, to prevent infection while treating patients. However, the comparative effectiveness of respirators and masks in preventing SARS-CoV-2 infection and the likelihood of experiencing adverse events (AEs) with wear are unclear.

A review identified challenges distinguishing primary reports of randomized trials for meta-research: A proposal for improved reporting.

Meta-research is the discipline of studying research itself. A core investigative tool in meta-research is the use of systematic or scoping reviews to study the characteristics, methods and reporting of primary research studies. In the context of identifying eligible publications for methodological reviews of randomized controlled trials (RCTs), a challenge is to efficiently distinguish the primary trial report - which reports results for the primary outcome - from other types of reports, including design papers and secondary or supplementary analyses, or what we collectively refer to as non-primary reports.